zombie trash
by 13pens
Summary: Zelena could have her brain and eat it, too. AU, SQ, Wicked Swan broship, Mills sisters, crackery, death a little bit everywhere if you take it technically.
1. THE EYE OF THE SHITSTORM

**A/N:** Fic operates on three premises:

1\. this takes place in any universe where zelena is a reformed asshole  
2\. zombies are a thing and exist iZombie style  
3\. i have NO chill

WARNINGS: there is no gratuitous gore. just mentioning of like, your typical brain parts being eaten and mentions of blood.

special thanks to steph for cackling with me and feeding me some lines as i feed these assholes brains

* * *

CHAPTER ONE: THE EYE OF THE SHITSTORM

It starts with the hair. The annoyingly, whiter than Snow, hair.

Zelena could pass it off as experimenting with highlights, but even that gets suspicious––why is Zelena walking around with only one highlight today and then like three the next. So she stocks up on 379: Golden Bronze. (She probably would have gone for Vivacious Red, but that would probably bring out her whitening eyes, and, oh, not to mention, her _pasty ass dead as fuck skin_. So it has to be a resounding no to Vivacious Red.)

The next to go is her taste. Like, she's become the actual worst about food. She won't eat at Granny's anymore. She's actually upsetting Regina with the faces of dissatisfaction during dinner. It needs more Sriracha, Zelena says. I didn't know you could pronounce that word, Regina mumbles.

Fuck off, sis.

And she doesn't really mean that, of course she doesn't. She's just cranky as hell. Probably because the only thing that can get her functioning properly is to, oh, I don't know, _consume human brains_. Honestly what the fuck. She'd cry about it, if her tear ducts functioned at all. But they don't. Probably makes her look like a heartless asshole, which you've got to be a little bit of if you're going to sneak off into the freeway to ambush some poor bastard.

It could be worse. She could be the kind of zombie that eats everyone on sight with no regard for anything else, but nah. Zelena could have her brain and eat it, too.

[-]

If the dead sleep forever, then the undead never sleep. That's how it goes, apparently. The only time she can doze off is if like the moon and the sun are fucking aligned so of course Zelena is wide awake when Regina knocks on her door like at shitfuck o'clock at night.

(After she's Neutrogena'd the fuck out of her heavily made-up face, she doesn't let Regina see her until the sun's gone completely down. Her deathly paleness can most likely be attributed to moonlight that way, though, hell, at this point, she probably emits her own moonlight. You know, if physics worked that way.)

"Come in," she says.

Regina peeks her head in, a black fuzz in the dark of the bedroom. "Do you have room for me?"

Usually, she doesn't have to ask. Every so often Regina has a bad night or a bad dream and Zelena is always there to provide the warm hugs. But now things are different. Zelena can't answer this question with a duh, there is always room for your crybaby self, get over here you loser I love you. Now it can only be more of a, I'm dead, Regina. I'm _dead_ and who knows if it's cuddle-born or some bullshit like that.

Except Regina doesn't know, and Zelena never plans to tell her.

"Yes," Zelena says.

When Regina tucks herself into her, she prays, really does, that she can't feel how _cold_ she is.

"I'm worried about you," Regina says, and Zelena rolls her eyes as if she could have ever said anything else. "You've been acting very strange and I need to know if things will be okay."

Zelena almost tells her right then, because _not_ telling her would be like, the dickiest move in the history of dick moves. But she doesn't.

"I'm fine," Zelena says. Dick. Regina's scalp is dangerously close to her lips, and she turns her head away to look at the ceiling. "I'm just having off days. Maybe I'm pregnant and I'm being hormonal."

Zelena snorts to herself cause man, yeah. She's not dead at all, in fact it's the opposite, right.

"Yeah, that's likely," Regina says sarcastically.

They laugh, but then Zelena really feels those phantom tears right now. She feels sick to her stomach and it's not because of the brain she ate, it's because they hadn't really laughed together in like a week because she's been way too preoccupied hiding this stupid secret and acquiring clumps of a very specific organ.

"I'm a horrible sister," she finds herself sobbing. "I cause you nothing but trouble."

(And right: the last person she ate had a nasty tendency for self pity and deprecation. That explains a lot. Nice.)

"That's not true," Regina says, soothingly but also warily. Zelena hasn't pulled this bullshit since they were first starting out.

"Name one time I've done something good for you."

That actually makes Regina angry, like, if Zelena wants to milk her for reassurance she could at least bother to be direct about it, instead of this emotionally manipulative crap. She sits up and hits the mattress with a fist. "What has gotten into you?"

"See!" Zelena points. "I _am_ horrible_._"

(Twists people's words and actions to prove own worthlessness. Honestly. Maybe she should play 20 questions with these assholes before she devours them.

_You like to compulsively lie? Haha, and then what?_)

[-]

Regina doesn't really talk to Zelena the next day, which probably means she's been talking about her to other people. Asking around. Investigating. Zelena almost wants to be there when Regina finds out that the reason why her sister is being a complete knob is because she's an _undead_ knob.

The man whose meninges she ripped open after cracking his skull like an egg lived in Portland, where he didn't have many friends and much less a girl or boyfriend. He was on his way visiting his mother in Bangor. She had Alzheimer's, so Zelena supposes she wouldn't really miss him, because she wouldn't really remember, would she?

You're such a _dick_, Zelena.

Tonight she's waiting by a different road, Storybrooke long behind her––it wouldn't do to eat one of her own; at least taking victims from the outer world would protect her from the law because Storybrooke didn't exist on their map, so she could just check out like _bye, bitch_.

Except when she's done stuffing her mouth with the medulla she's carrying back to town like it's a fucking drumstick, law enforcement _does_ get her, in the form of Sheriff Fucksake Swan.

Zelena considers using her newfound hella fast running skills to book it right out of there, but that would require _not coming back_, probably.

"What?" Zelena shrugs lamely. "Can't a girl get some fresh night air?"

Emma doesn't smile. She points her gun at Zelena. "Hands behind your back."

"What––"

"Hands behind your back, Zelena."

Oh shit. Shit. Of course. Zelena's entire face and hands and shirt is covered in _blood_. Man, she fucked _up_.

"I can explain," she says calmly. Her hands are still not behind her stupid back.

"Zelena, please don't make me hurt you," Emma pleads earnestly. "I'll take you back to the station, Regina will be waiting for you––"

Zelena _freaks_. Like legit starts breathing hard, heart pumping loudly, and shaking her head like you just told her Glinda came to town with their sex tapes and dammit, she ate a panic-prone brain. _Just_ her motherfucking luck.

"No, please don't do that," she begs, "Regina can't know."

But Emma's making the rather _unwise_ attempt to restrain Zelena, which she absolutely should not have done because in one swift motion, girl has a nice big scratch on her left cheek.

Ho-ly-shit.

And the effects must be instantaneous because Emma's face goes white in fear and it never, never recovers. She drops her gun right on the asphalt ground.

"What the fuck did you _do_?" Emma compresses the wound with her hand, but it's useless. Her blood in that area is thickening like butter.

"I panicked!" Zelena cries.

"And panicking involves trying to rip my throat out?!"

"Yes, my reflexes have become _very_ specific!"

Emma breathes out and digs her hands in her scalp, pacing around idly. "You're a fucking zombie."

"Yes," Zelena nods, ashamed, but when the cat's out of the bag, it _jumps_ out.

"And now I will be, too." Emma looks like she's going to throw up. "_Christ_. How am I going to tell my parents."

Zelena makes a pathetic gesture at sympathy with a shrug and a head tilt. "I don't know how to apologize for this, honestly."

"Oh god." Emma bends over, her hands on her knees, winded like she just ran four miles in four minutes.

"Look at it this way, we're the palest people in town besides like your mother and Aurora, and if people haven't noticed me yet they certainly won't notice you."

"I think it will be very noticeable once we start eating the _brains of Storybrooke's inhabitants_, but thank you for you input," Emma says irritatedly. Then she looks like she's going to cry, but they're coming out like mud because she's very, very slowly dying already.

Zelena grabs Emma by the forearms and makes her look at her. "Look, whenever I catch a brain I'll split it with you. Do you have a preference for a particular lobe or hemisphere?"

Emma looks at her like she is the product of a threeway between God, Satan, and the Aflac duck.

[-]

In retrospect, Zelena shouldn't have assumed that zombies like, _synced_ with each other when it came to cravings. For her, an entire brain can last her somewhere in between three days to a week. One of the temporal lobes probably lasts a day. But Emma, her zombie metabolism is Fucking. Wild. Girl would ask for more even after downing the midbrain––Zelena's favorite part, which she'd have to sacrifice for Emma's unholy brain feasting libido.

They'd discussed _lines_ before. Like, how far each would go just to get the B. I have to stop at people younger than thirty, Zelena'd say. And people I know, of course. Emma nodded in agreement, _but. with. hesitance_.

And _so in retrospect_, she should absolutely have not been surprised when Emma had called her at buttfuck in the sunless morning to meet her in the woods.

"I ate Hook."

"You _what_?!" Zelena hisses. "_He's_ inside this fucking body bag?!"

Emma sets her jaw to the side in annoyance and puts her hands on her waist, foot resting on what would be Hook's shoulder. She's still got a big band-aid on her cheek where Zelena got her. "I panicked, okay. I didn't _mean_ to target him."

Zelena huffs and crosses her arms. "I've been looking for a reason to do this to him for _weeks_, Swan."

"Look, he wouldn't stop bothering me, and things got physical so I ended up scratching him in the face, and then––like, no, right? Hook as a zombie is a no. That's another mouth to feed and more bodies to hide."

"So you ate him."

Emma swallows. "So I ate him. Help me dump this fucker in the harbor."

[-]

At the very least, this incident traumatizes Emma's infant hunger into controlling it's damn self. But at what cost? Zelena asks. This asshole now goes around wearing black leather jackets, gross amounts of eyeliner, and whenever she passes by a mirror she just cannot _resist_ checking out her own bust. The fuck, Swan.

And only when she's got pieces of Hook's brain in her that she is absolutely fucktrucked by the revelation that she will _never be getting ass again_.

"Regina thinks I don't want to fuck her anymore," Emma sobs over a the parietal lobe of some fifty-something man as they hide in the woods. Zelena rolls her eyes and tears out the cerebellum for herself.

"It's not like I don't want to fuck her, I _do_ want to, but what kind of disaster would that be? What if my nibble becomes a bite, or I scratch her back with my nails? What if I scrape too hard on her vaginal walls? That's the worst way to go!"

Zelena gags mid-consumption. "Please never mention my sister's vaginal walls to my face again."

"We need to do something about this Zelena. We need to tell Regina. Maybe this is reversible."

"Don't you think I'd have found a way if it were reversible? Are you forgetting which of the Mills girls read like a fuckton of Magic Academia to make a working time portal?"

"We should still tell her."

"Tell me what?"

Zelena and Emma freeze. In all their feasting they hadn't heard Regina approach, even though her feet had been crunching loudly on fallen branches and leaves. They hadn't even seen the bright white of her flashlight. Useless hunters, they are. Useless.

Regina shines the light on their bloodied mouths and hands, and she sighs, taking it _much_ more calmly than either of them would have expected. "What have you tontas done."

[-]

Regina takes them to Zelena's old isolated farmhouse, and out of everything on Zelena's list of ways Regina could possibly react to her sister and girlfriend being murderous zombies, sitting them down to wipe the blood off their chins was _not_ one of them.

"How long have you known?" Emma asks.

"When people started asking me if you and Zelena were having an affair," Regina says flatly. "And I would've believed it too, with all the sneaking around and secrecy but then Hook goes missing, there are reports all over Maine news about bodies being found out in the road, messily buried and with their craniums marred and emptied beyond belief. You two don't like my food anymore, instead would rather down a bottle of Sriracha or Tapatío, which is absurd, because Zelena is as gringa as they come."

"Hey," Zelena interjects, and Regina wipes right over her mouth with the towel for effect.

"And what," Emma says, rubbing her hands with a wet paper towel, "you're just like, okay with this?"

"I'm..." Regina pauses, sitting down on the stool across from them. "No. You're still... _you_, and I haven't completely _lost_ you as I would if you two were merely dead. But I can't just let you _eat_ people."

"What do you suggest?" Zelena asks. "Grave robbing?"

"You could wait til people died, you know, _naturally_."

"The death rate doesn't look so good here," Emma says. "Unless we wait for another Big Bad to cause some tragic damage, which I'm not sure I'd like to deal with as a zombie."

Before Regina can open her mouth to communicate whatever, there's a large crash outside the door on the patio. It's Emma, ever the savior, even in zombiehood, that springs up first, her arm outstretched to keep the other two behind her.

Unpleasant, salivic noises and grunts make themselves audible and they sound grotesquely familiar, they sound like––

"Oh fuck no," Zelena mumbles, and then the front door is blown off with two blurs whizzing past the curtains just to show off or something. The lights go off, and she feels a fist against her jaw and she's actually down, and even Emma is flat on her ass and suddenly, like the worst of her nightmares, someone is straddling Regina and hissing over her until––

"Tinkerbell?"

The disgusting gurgles stop. "Regina?"

The second one of them groans, holds his head up. "Great."

While they have a chance, Zelena tackles Tinkerbell off of Regina, pinning her down with her arms at the back, and Emma restrains the second dude, which is, surprise surprise, Dr. Whale, like so.

"I like to keep cuffs on my person at all times," Emma says, latching them on to both Whale and Tink.

"There are more of us?" Whale asks, and Zelena scowls, because fuck that, she is not getting grouped up with Flying Booger and Frankenstein, who instead of creating monsters, is one now.

But Regina is bothered. So god damn bothered. She's like, actually sweating. "How many more people have been affected?"

"You can say the Z word you know," Tink says, face still on the floor. She sounds ashamed.

Regina is not having it. "_How many more_?"

[-]

Twenty. Mother. Fucking. Zombies.

Well, eighteen, because no one knows about Emma and Zelena yet save for Regina, Whale and Tink, who for their own reasons have decided to protect with secrecy. Then you've got our old girl Ruby––gods, everyone is mourning that one, but at least eating people isn't something _new_ to her––along with David, Mulan, Astrid, Bashful, a handful of other fuckers and like six kids, ranging from elementary to middle school age. What the fuck happens when children turn into zombies? Who knows. Maybe they'll know soon.

So this is like, The Worst. People could handle shit when populations were being flung back and forth from Storybrooke to the Enchanted Forest so much that they were getting temporal and spacial whiplash. People could handle it when Zelena was kidnapping babies and flying around on a goddamn broom. Barely anyone so much as blinked an eye when the Nevengers team took off to save Wonderboy. But a zombie apocalypse? The Worst. This was no longer a fight for the royal bourgeois. Former peasant-folk could no longer look up from their newspapers after the earth finished shaking and go, man, what are these rich white people plus Regina doing now.

Madam Mayor, what will you do?

"Containment," she says, and it hurts her to say it because now Emma and Zelena, sitting in the audience of City Hall smelling of too much perfume and too much make-up, are looking at each other with fearful anticipation. They sit with the rest of the townsfolk, while the eighteen are on the other side of the hall, sitting in their own little section.

"And what does that entail?" asks Granny, nervously, thinking of her girl Ruby. Always thinking of her.

"Well," Regina starts. "It seems that this state of being is spread through scratches, bites. Fluids less so, but I wouldn't cross it off the list. So those of you with clear symptoms will have to be isolated––I can easily order a property expansion on my sister's farmhouse to make everyone affected comfortable. For those who have come into contact but are not yet showing symptoms, you will have to come in for periodic testing at the hospital until you are cleared."

"What about the brain eating thing?" someone else asks.

Regina swallows. "I am informed that the brains do not necessarily have to be human. Maine is full of wildlife. And I'm sure the taste and nutritional value won't be so different."

Bet you she never thought she'd ever have to say those fucking words before. This is a trainwreck waiting to happen.

"Meanwhile I'll assemble a research team to make this reversible," Regina adds, because what is politics without empty promises, "and make sure that we can all return to our normal way of life as fast as possible."

The last to raise a hand is Smee, holding his red beanie against his stomach.

"Yes?"

"Was it one of them?" he asks. "That killed Hook. Did one of them do it?"

Emma wants to scream but instead opts for squeezing Zelena's hand.

Regina regards Smee sadly, hands resting calmly at the sides of the podium. "I don't know, Smee. I'm sorry for your loss. Each person will be questioned individually so we can learn what they know."

[-]

"They're not _people_."

It's muttered in the clamor of a dispersed town meeting, so Regina doesn't hear it. But Emma and Zelena sure as fuck do.


	2. HONESTLY WHAT THE FUCK

CHAPTER TWO: HONESTLY WHAT THE FUCK

Henry is a gift to world. Everyone knows that. Boy has a stomach so fragile that frog dissections for biology were a complete _nope_ for him, and here he is helping them chop up deer brain into their chow mein.

"Just go crazy with the hot sauce," Emma instructs from the kitchen island, sitting on a stool next to Zelena.

"Got it, boss," Henry replies, super nasal because he's got a clothespin pinching his nose.

They feast greedily on their plates, and Henry kind of like, stares in absolute horror.

But it's a horror that comes with fascination, so he's also like, "whoa." How often is it that you get to watch zombies eat without also being a target for dessert?

"You're very calm about this whole thing," Zelena says when she finally minds her fucking manners, taking a napkin to wipe around her mouth. "Don't tell me Storybrooke has seen zombies before."

Henry shrugs. "There was that one time with Daniel, though I'm not sure if he ate people. He just sort of tore off Whale's arm."

"Christ."

"I'm sorry about some of your classmates, kid," Emma offers sympathetically.

"Don't be," he says. "Soon Mom's going to find a way to turn everyone back to normal."

Zelena and Emma stop eating and exchange a glance. Oh no. Regina, why. Why would you not tell your kid about this.

"What?"

"Kiddo," Emma begins shakily. "Your mom likely said that at the meeting for crowd control. There is no known cure for this. We're _dead_."

It takes a while for Henry to process, and then his face scrunches up, and he looks at Emma like he's seen her in a coffin at a wake. Because even if they're here now, even if they can still talk like normal and play video games and go out for burgers and milkshakes, it won't be that way in the end. You can't live a normal life as a goddamn zombie forever.

Emma rises from her stool and hugs him, sobbing with no tears coming out, and they both look so vulnerable in each other's arms that Zelena has to look away.

Henry is a gift to humanity. They are no longer a part of that.

[-]

Zelena hates herself. She used to do that a lot anyway, before she learned that Regina was everything, but now it's like, tenfold. Like ten U-hauls full of crates of self-loathing arrived in Zelena's driveway.

She cost Regina half her god damn family. She could have just been _chill_ the night Emma found her with medulla all over her face, she could have spared Emma the grief of never getting fucked again or never sparring with her son with a sword again. She could have spared Emma the sorrow of having eaten Hook. Yeah she's never really liked him, but she _ate _the man. She ate him and when she sees Smee she wants to hurl because unlike their past sources of brain, they are both seeing the mourning happening.

She should have ran when she found out about herself. She should run now, while she still can.

With a backpack and rolling luggage, Zelena heads for the town line. It's better this way. She'll never have to worry about panicking and ripping open anyone she loves, or hates, or is lukewarm about.

But obviously she's not leaving just yet. The next day she'll still be here, helping with the damage and grieving her own dead heart out. So what changes her mind?

Seeing Mulan, pale like a marble statue and covered in deep red, standing there at the town line.

Instead of trying to justify herself like Zelena had tried to do when Emma had found her this exact way, Mulan's shoulders sag and she falls to her knees.

"I had to eat," she cries tearlessly, "I had to eat."

Zelena barely knows her but she drops her things and comes down to hug Mulan. She hugs her because damn, when she had her first real kill, she could have used one of these, too.

[-]

"Deer brain's not cutting it, sis," Zelena says, pointing a sharp finger down at Regina's desk where she sits. "It's not kosher."

"And eating human brains is?" Regina counters.

"If you think crowding a bunch of starving zombies in one house is going to do anything for your containment strategy for much longer, you're asking for a real zombie apocalypse. What happens when herd mentality kicks in? No one is safe."

"What do you want me to do, then?"

Zelena swallows. "You need to find a way to put us all in different realm. Grow a magic bean. Write another curse, but make it undead-specific."

Regina rises, and there's real hurt in her eyes. Her shoulders are tense and honestly Zelena how the fuck dare you even suggest this. "If I do that, you and Emma stay."

"Not gonna happen," she says tersely. It's heartbreaking. It really is. But Zelena just spent last night cleaning the blood of Mulan's body and giving her new clothes all the while she shook and experienced the memories of the bro she ate. If she and Emma stay, people are still at risk, and this will all be a disgusting red, pink, and white cycle.

Regina cries. Oh how Zelena wishes she could still cry.

Then Blue runs in, out of breath, legs and arms shaking underneath her black dress. "We have an emergency. At the farmhouse."

Blue never comes to Regina for anything, mind this. And Blue is the kind of asshole that, given her way, these zombies wouldn't be seeing the light of day. They'd have been gotten rid of days ago, for the "greater good." But no, this time she's got to think of her own. Among them are Astrid and Tink, after all.

When they get to the farmhouse, Zelena really, really wishes she could still cry. Firemen are still putting out a flames at the back of the house. Paramedics are at the center of a small crowd, though, heh, what are you going to do, resuscitate zombies?

Zelena makes a count of the zombies she can see outside. Fifteen. Three, where the meds are, are covered in white sheets, stains of red concentrated in the head area.

Emma is by the non-zombie crowd, holding Granny back as she wails inconsolably.

Regina walks slowly to the bodies, not daring to lift the sheets but instead has one of the meds whisper to her. Her face goes from merely serious to silent horror, and when she's heard the names listed––Tink, Ruby, and Whale––she turns to both the zombie and human crowds.

"Who did this?" she asks, barely any breath in it. And when there is no answer, she lowers her head and clenches her fist and speaks louder, like the good ol' Evil Queen days. "_Who did this_?"

"They're not people," someone in the human crowd shouts back. They disperse to reveal Smee. "They were once but they're not anymore."

"They're not _human_ anymore," Regina growls. "But they are _people_."

But Smee is not having it. Dude is so angry. And he should be; his best friend was killed, there's no body to mourn, and no one else seems to care. But he's going red in the face, shouting filth at Regina and Emma has to restrain him.

She makes the mistake of calling him "mate."

She doesn't even notice the way Smee goes ab-so-lute-ly fucking _quiet_, the way the anger turns from shock to revelation right back to _fury_, like one complete emotional orbit. Oh, but Zelena does. She sees him pull out a god damn knife before Emma can even look down.

So Zelena lunges. Topples Smee right over the grass. Hisses. Gurgles. Feels her vision go funny in the way it only does when her victims are struggling but then Regina shouts her name and she snaps out of it. She gazes below at the scared shitless Smee. She lifts her head and looks around at everyone, who back away slowly.

_Fuck_. She just _had_ to take one for the flippin' team.

[-]

The townspeople are going _wild_ in front of town hall.

How long was Zelena a zombie? Why did you not keep her in the farmhouse, too? Who are you protecting, Madam Mayor? Us or them? Are you using them? Are they a weapon? Are you going _evil_ again?

Emma is behind the curtain, actually praying with a motherfucking rosary.

[-]

Emma is scared. Like, getting caught by the cops with a bag full of stolen watches that her shitty boyfriend left her with scared. Pregnant and in prison scared. Giving birth scared.

She hasn't been able to contact Zelena at all. They all dubbed her the most dangerous––she jumped the radar for the longest, she's the newest in town and therefore has less attachment and therefore has no qualms over killing people. Idiot went and took the fall for Hook, too. Moron.

She's running out of hair dye and foundation. Fuck fuck fuck. And she can't just swoop into the general store looking like this to restock, either, not when everyone has an open eye where they once had it shut. She needs to go to Regina's. But when she goes downstairs, Snow is there, looking up at her. She has baby Neal in her arms.

She's been crying. "Emma, sweetheart, we need to talk."

Emma swallows, holding her arms. "About what?"

When she gets to the bottom of the steps, Snow backs away. No, mom, please don't do that. Don't do that to me.

"Your eyes were green," she says. "They're not anymore."

Emma's face scrunches up. She wants a hug but she's not going to get that, and even if she did, it would be one hell of a bad move. She nods, sobbing. "I'm going to get out of here, Mom," Emma wobbles. "It's okay. I'll be gone."

"No," Snow protests. "You don't have to. We can find a way to make this work."

Emma cries, but it's all lumps in throats and muscle movements. She'll never get the satisfaction of tears running down her face. "Dad couldn't stay and neither could I."

Snow shakes her head, her own eyes welling up with tears and she still has Neal in her arms when she hugs Emma, puts her head right under Emma's nose.

"Mom, I haven't eaten for days," she warns, she _cries_.

"It's okay, Emma. I love you."

Emma feels her vision go blurry and a hole in her stomach begins to open. "_Mom_."

[-]

The last time Regina received a text from Emma going _come to Snow's right now_, it was for a surprise potluck party. Granny had brought in Regina's favorite shepherd's pie, Emma made tacos. Snow and Charming made her an ice cream cake, and Zelena, of course, provided the wine.

When Regina opens the door to Snow's apartment, well––it's a feast, all right.

Emma sits next to Snow's immobile body, rocking herself back and forth in a crazed daze while Neal cries frantically in his crib next to the couch. Emma had put a towel over Snow's head, to hide the damage.

"Emma," Regina whispers, and she legit does not know what in the world to feel. This is honestly Too. Much.

"She wouldn't listen to me," Emma says in a disturbingly high pitched voice, holding her head and rocking, rocking, the blood on her hands making bright streaks down her white cheeks. "She knew and she still couldn't help herself. Didn't anyone tell her not to hug hungry zombies? Why did we have to be zombies? Why couldn't we be like Octavia Butler vampires, with less death and more polyamorous sex?"

"I should have listened to Zelena," Regina says, shaking. She doesn't know why _Snow_ would be the last straw of all things, but fuck, this is _sick_. And not like the hey-Regina-watch-me-skate-on-the-roof-of-the-B-and-B _sick_. "I should have sent you all somewhere else, somewhere safer."

Emma stops rocking. For a moment it's just Neal's shrill cries in the air until Emma looks up at Regina. "You can still fix this."

Regina is still fixated on the towel over Snow's head that she doesn't pay attention when Emma rises until she hears the click of a gun. Her head shoots in Emma's direction.

"What are you doing?" Regina demands as Emma places the gun in Regina's hands, leaving maroon stains on the back of her palms. Then she lifts her hands so that the end of the barrel meets Emma's forehead.

Regina loses all breathing capability. "No."

"You have to kill me," Emma says sadly, with finality, like it's the only god damn way.

"You just ate Snow White's self-righteous self-sacrificial brain, are you sure this is a good idea?"

Emma nods. "You have to do it, Regina. And after me you have to do it to Zelena, to David, to everyone." She smiles, and it's so fucking _wrong_. "Please."

Regina shakes her head, tries to pull her arms back but Emma's grip is _killer_. "I'm not going to kill you."

"I'm already dead, Regina."

"No, I'm not going to do it!" she cries, and fuck, it's Daniel all over again. This is the cruelest thing to happen to her to fucking date. "Don't make me do it, Emma, please."

Emma's face hardens, and her nails threaten to dig into Regina's fingers, and Regina almost yelps in terror. "Shoot me, Regina!" she shouts, angrily. "Pull the fucking trigger!"

"Emma, let me go!"

"_Do it!_" Emma's eyes go dark and her mouth is opening wider and wider and––"_Or I'll fucking devour you––"_

A loud bang later, Emma falls to the floor. Black and red substance flies off to splatter on Regina's face. It feels like mud. She screams, and screams, and screams.

* * *

"And that's how my dream last night went," Zelena concludes, taking a sip of her iced tea.

Regina and Emma are holding one another protectively at the other side of the booth, staring at Zelena with horrified eyes.

"The fuck is _wrong_ with you?" says Emma.

"Whatever you ate before you went to bed, please don't eat it again," Regina mumbles.

"Oh come on," Zelena drawls. "It was only a dream. Zombies aren't a thing."

"That shit was so vivid it was probably a premonition," Emma counters.

"Alright, so I added some details for the sake of storytelling. Take a chill pill, Swan."

Emma sighs, and soon she and Regina disentangle to receive their meals from Ruby, who, thank gods, is not a zombie, and is not dead.

"I'll hand it to you, Zelena," Regina starts. "Your head comes up with very interesting nonsense.

"Doesn't it?" Zelena beams, satisfied, mouthful of chicken tender. "I should write a book about it, to be honest. Could someone pass the hot sauce?"

**END**


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